There aren’t many items that I would say that you need to have. At a push, I would say you probably you need to have a good pair of scissors, but there is one other item I would suggest for every cross stitcher. A tracing pad.

They might not be the most obviously needed tool in cross stitch and are often overlooked, but they actually solve a lot of problems people have with cross stitch. Considering the price point is from $20 to $50 they’re also budget-friendly.

Light

First up is the obvious advantage of a light pad; it gives you more light. Most cross stitchers do try to light their areas up as much as possible, and with more and more people looking at getting a daylight bulb for their cross stitch (which can cost a lot more than you realize) people overlook the more practical options. A tracing pad can either sit on your table, or lap, without getting hot, and provide targeted light right at your work.
In addition, any extra light you can muster will always help you keep your eyesight while cross stitching.

Working with Black fabric

Another advantage of the pad is actually the type of light that it brings, specifically from below. We suggested tracing pads back when we wrote about how to cross stitch with black fabric and it’s still our go-to option. Due to the backlighting, it lights up all the holes in your fabric showing you exactly where to place the needle.

Pattern Making

But what about less obvious advantages? Pattern making. Now, exactly how it will help you here depends on how you make patterns, so I’ve broken this one out.
 
Paper pattern makers – If you choose to make patterns on paper rather than a digital way, a tracing pad allows you to make patterns MUCH easier. Thanks to its original tracing pad purpose you open your world up to being able to make a pattern out of anything!
 
Everyone – This one is my personal bugbear; picking colors is hard. Whilst cross stitch pattern software does a good job at picking colors, there is nothing quite like your own eye. That’s one reason why we’re a fan of using a DMC color card but picking accurate colors depends on a good light source.

Health

We’ve already lightly touched on keeping your eyes healthy, however, a tracing pad also helps with back issues too. It’s actually really easy to get back issues when cross stitching, mostly thanks to the posture we take to get light. However uplighting means you tend not to slouch in your chair causing some of the most problematic issues.

The Little things

And finally, we come to the little things. The things that whilst the tracing pad doesn’t help with directly, having it there greatly improves.
 
Threading your needle – Threading needles can be a pain for some people, and even with the best needle threaders or self-threading needles it can still be hard for some. But the addition of a light source that you can use to help you see the thread, but not blind you in the process, it a great thing.
 
Frogging – Let’s face it, frogging sucks, even with scissors that make frogging easier anything helps. The light pad allows you to light your area up much more, and see those pesky threads to rip.
 
Happy stitching!
Lord Libidan